It hasn’t quite been a week since Chris Paul went down with a badly separated shoulder, and we’re still over a month away from his earliest anticipated return. The Clippers have now played three games sans Paul, and it’s been, well, it’s been a mixed bag. No need to worry, though! We spent countless hours arriving at several solutions that are guaranteed to help L.A. not just cope with Paul’s absence, but flourish in spite of it. Take your time, Chris. Relax in Palm Springs, fly to Germany, do whatever. We’ve got it covered!

10 Solutions to the No-CP3 Problem

1. Sign Baron Davis. Where is Baron, you ask? In a basement in Torrance, wearing just a Gucci vest, working on his mix-tape? Does he even play basketball anymore? Who cares. Roll a Kia onto the court and let him throw lobs out the sunroof. WHO IS YOUR POINT GOD NOW?

2. Make Blake the point-forward he’s always wanted to be. He wears #32 for a reason – he’s the evolutionary Magic Johnson. Look at those moves! Look at those other moves! Blake can’t help that he was born into the body of behemoth. He’s always dreamed of running showtime. Now he can.

3. Call Doc off the bench. Doc Rivers has 4,889 career assists. That’s only 940 less than Chris Paul, and it’s more than any other Clipper by a long shot. Who better to replace the coach-on-the-floor than the actual coach? As an added bonus, maybe Doc will bring back the short shorts.

5. Sign Bruce Bowen and have him get “tangled up” with every opposing point guard on the first play. “Oh, I’m sorry Damian, were you coming down from a jumper? I didn’t see you there.” “Oops! You really sold that pump-fake, Steph. Sorry about your head.” I’d suggest Matt Barnes do this, but after the first instance he’d be suspended for the season, because Barnes.

6. Start Jamal Crawford at point guard. When Boston replaced Rajon Rondo with Jordan Crawford, it sort of worked. The transitive name property means this will work, too.

7. Forget the point guard position. Forget all positions and just play big, really big. Your new starting and crunch-time lineups: Jamison, Blake, Mullens, Hollins and DeAndre. No one will know how to defend this team, because the Clippers won’t know how to run an offense with this team. If no one knows anything, the playing field is level. Checkmate.

8. Have Tyronn Lue climb into the Staples Center rafters and sabotage the water main. Once the arena floods, games will be postponed for weeks. This might mean playing 10 consecutive back-to-back-to-backs to end the season, but Paul will need to get back into shape for the playoffs anyway.

9. Host an AND1-style one-on-one tournament at L.A. Live on Friday. The winner starts versus the Lakers. I’m pretty sure this is how Dallas discovered J.J. Barea, and anyway, there’s got to be another “The Professor” out there somewhere. On a related note, I’ve been practicing pick-and-rolls with a lawn chair in my garage.

10. Convince Darren Collison every game for the next six weeks is versus Orlando. Hypnotize him, tell him it’s a weird scheduling thing and the league is making the Magic wear their alternate uniforms. All 27 of them. Darren will score so many points, when Paul comes back, Doc might just bring CP3 off the bench!

These are great ideas, ones that will help L.A. endure Paul’s absence, and I look forward to the Clippers implementing all of them. Since he joined the franchise, Los Angeles is 12-10 when Paul doesn’t play. And in the ultra-competitive West, that isn’t going to be good enough. The team will have to do something, anything, everything.

Yeah, Clippers got lucky there. Hedo Turkalo is working out of the Clippers now. Can’t wait to watch him bricking 3’s in the playoffs.

Bongstradamus

Every time I see Hedo I keep thinking he’s going to pass to Peja Stojakovic for an open 3.

Jake

Hate to see Bledsoe hurt, but it will benefit the Clippers, since now they likely will finish ahead of the Suns in the standings and I was getting concerned they wouldn’t. But it’s not going to be much help. Golden State is heating up and has the easier schedule the rest of the season compared to the Clippers, so they’ll likely win the division. Before the season I predicted Houston, San Antonio, Oklahoma City, Memphis and Golden State would finish ahead of the Clippers. Still looks that way except for Memphis, but now it also looks like Portland will too. So that’s still the sixth spot. I really don’t see how the Clippers are going to do better than that unless they add a good player, preferably on the front line.

When Gasol gets back, Memphis could heat up again and still make the playoffs, but the Clippers shouldn’t fall below then 8 spot unless Paul is out past the All-Star break.

http://www.bboy360.com/ Bboy 360

Memphis has a lot of games to make up. I doubt they can catch the Clippers. It’ll be very hard for them to make the playoffs. CP3 is only gone for 6 weeks and maybe he’ll be more rested for the playoffs this way.

Shuggah21

a little early to anoint GSW as division winners… remember how hot we were last December? Lot of season left to play